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About Oregon daily emerald. (Eugene, Or.) 1920-2012 | View Entire Issue (Dec. 8, 1971)
(_Commentary Dick Huddleston Messages for Canadians and friends Pierre Le Pigeon screamed under an incredible violence barrier early yesterday morning with some long awaited news of the Barrens to the North. I could hardly believe my eyes when I found him perched high atop the flag outside our apartment. Immediately I knew something was afoul. And what was worse (if not the pun), when I beckoned Pierre to get off that silly flag pole, he seemed not to know me for what 1 was. Pierre stayed only a moment to detach a neatly-rolled parchment which floated into my grasp. Like most foreign parchment, it was terribly frail. As I began to unroll the paper I saw tiny black writing stretching the length of the script. Focusing my binoculars into view, I struggled with the scrawling semi-print which was no doubt some kind of bizarre code to throw off the RCMP and other pigeon hunters. I was only able to discern the following wire reports (date unknown, but then again news from up there is better than no news at all). Victoria. B.C. Mrs. (ms) Erma Mc Dougall, long-time neighbor to Prime Minister W.A.C. Bennett, demonstrated in front of the Empress Hotel on Wednesday morning. The elderly matron babbled profusely, leading our reporter to believe she was incensed with Bennett’s rumored scale of his house to the Raineer Brewing Company of Seattle , Washington in ex change for another new beer recipe. Somewhat calmed later during the news conference, Erma begged for a wee nip of her Scotch heritage to keep the country above water. As usual the Prime Minister was temporarily disconnected for com ment. Hoping, B.C. Fred Cameron raised his grass prices again yesterday. The in crease marked a new record high of sixty five cents a gallon. Hiis reporter was surprised to learn of the high price but apparently Fred wants the money. During a short short interview, Ms. Cameron said, “We’re trying to get ’em before they hit the Fraser Canyon and wider spaces. We’ve put our station at the edge of town, for the ‘last chance to gas up routine’!” Ms. Cameron denied any middle men were involved, claiming it came straight across the border. Edmonton, Alberta Demonstrators picketing the high price charged to Proctor and Gamble for Alberta threw trees out of the capital building today. Premier Lougheed declared he was not being unfair assessing the New York concern five cents for each tree taken out of Alberta. But protesters were vehement in their demands to give away the mer chandise claiming that the government didn’t “own” nature’s forests. Another demonstration is planned for tomorrow, and their leader Taddy Smith hai threatened another hunger strike. Sweet Hope, Sask. Psychologists Milton Mountaindune and Elizabeth Brady announced that children in Saskatchewan have forgotten their friends to the South. When asked how this fact will affect the National Policy, Mountaindune declared, “We’ll simply have to lift our embargo on American T.V. and National Public Radio. How else can we get these children together?” Winnipeg, Man. One Hundred Years of the Manitoba White Man climaxed the Biscuit Theater run of the 1871-1971 Cen tennial Celebration. Hie Royal Winnipeg Ballet were mobbed following their heroic rendition of This Land Was Their Land. However, mixed audiences may be in troduced next year according to Chief Running Barrel. “Our people wouldn’t understand so we might as well join in the fun,” said Barrel with a rather different look in his eye. Ottawa, Ont. Reporters flocked to Uplands Airport from as far West as North Bay, Ont. for the Prime Minister’s annual news conference. The twin-engine Beaver crunched down at 9:00 P.M. after an uneven flight from the Riviera. 1116 event coincided with the Amchitka Blast but a glance at His Honor dressed in his everlasting beaver coat dispelled anv thoughts for the present. The P.M. and Mrs. (ms) P.M. had a lovely vacation .... Finally His Honor asked what was happening at home. No one seemed to know but several reporters suggested our manufacture of bullets should be curtailed to honor the Blast. The P.M. carefully reminded the press of their thankless attitude toward protection and free speech and our commitment to continue in whatever needs to be continued. Several hours later as this last hanger-on begged his leave, His Honor declared he might as well go home too. Montreal. Que. Rene Levesque thought by some to be a Friendly Leader of Quebec was apparently charged with hit and-run by the Provincial Police. Spokesmen for Mr. Levesque stated, “as usual the charges were unfair, false, put up, and “Angelic.” The confessed Mr.Levesque erringly and unknowingly backed into the Molsen Limousine at the Montreal Forum, but in no way was at tempting to leave the accident behind. Provincial Police would not deny Mr. Levesque’s apprehension nor would they indicate how long he could be held. St. John’s, Nfld. Premier Joey Smallwood crept out of his fog-horn high atop Signal Hill yesterday declaring “I am I am I am ... in control even if nobbody wants to vote for me.” Mr. Smallwood launched into a long harangue but the screech was so heavy on this script writer and a local ship-dog that we had to leave the Premier to his own. The fog quickly engulfed us again—and we were as much in the dark as ever. Hay River, N.W.T. Government of ficials enjoyed a pleasant flight east over the barrens of Northern Manitoba and the North West Territories. But according to one of the litter carriers, there was no sign of Farley Mowat’s dear People. The official stated, “It’s a barren land with nothing at all, nothing at all to live on. I’d be very surprised if there were any People there at all. How could these People exist without food? In fact it could be that there were never any People living in that area. Everyone knows Farley Mowat has a somewhat unbridled imagination. . . .” Farther-to-the-North-Somewhere, N.W.T. Santa issued his Pre-Christmas greeting today stepping out to wave to Rudolph and Prancer (Dancer was off somewhere with Donner.) Santa lamented the wage-price freeze this year, declaring it will be impossible to get any further south than Key Biscayne. However, Santa insisted his trip would be a joyous occasion if only to see all those little igloos everybody is sprouting up where there’s no snow. “Makes me feel right at home,” the lovely old man grunted, “A joy to the Soul and makes me want to wish my friends a Merry Christmas.” ( Letters Without Thinking We are often quick to criticize without thinking. Bruce Jancin's letter in Tuesday’s Kmerald is a good example. True, the Co-op prices are not always competitive, but 1 would not classify the surroundings as ‘‘sterilized" or the per sonnel as "obnoxious". Furthermore, the only people who should feel like criminals are criminals, and if the mere presence of (and I use the term loosely) "detectives" makes 4 "nearly impossible to enjoy flipping through a magazine or browsing down the aisles" for some people, then those people have more hang-ups than I care to discuss now 1 personally have never noticed any “flunky floorwalkers", nor felt any inhibitions because of the fear of what somebody in the Co-op might see, mainly because I have nothing to hide. Besides, I consider the thought of plainclothes ob servers a lot more acceptable than massive price raises due to extensive theft, although I must admit that it is too bad that they are required. But Mr. Jancin's attack on the referendum is totally unjustified. No matter what the Co-op tries (o do, they can’t win. When they think that they may have found a partial solution to the ram pa.it theivery. and make an effort to contact the students for an opinion before making any decision, they are attacked with such reasoning as, “perhaps they are unaware that many students are so turned off by the Co-op that they won’t go inside, even to cast a W vote.” I say that if a person won’t even go inside a building for » few seconds to cast a ballot against something which he is wildly opposed to, then his vote doesn’t matter anyway, since he will obviously never come in to the store except in the most extreme emergency. This is a chance for the students to make their opinion known! And fur thermore, this is not the only chance. I would like to know how many times Mr. Jancin has brought his complaints to the manager, or even taken five minutes of his time to write a letter. Or how many times he has attended a Co-op board meeting. People seem to think that when so mething is wrong, they personally are getting screwed-over by the power group. Then, they squawk and bitctT and raise feelings of resentment, but never once do they get off their lazy ass and try to make constructive changes. If YOU don’t like it, show it! Hiis same thing happened a few months ago, when someone wrote a flamboyant letter to the Emerald com plaining about the price of wax. The next day, the manager of the Co-op also wrote a letter, expressing his regret over a mistake, and would people please call future problems to his attention, before they started creating useless hostilities. I think what this world needs is a little more co-operation and a lot more com munication. Steve Hallock Sophomore ( "...and this little, old grey-haired lady asks me, "Are they phantom Jets, young man?”, and I says, "Yes, ma'am, they are." And then she slugged me!”